On entering the DataCafe, visitors are invited to share 50 words about how they are feeling that day. This information is then processed to reveal the sentiment of their memo, which is fed into a real-time display of how visitors are feeling along with trending words. As a reward for sharing their data guests are given a code to unlock a cookie from a padlocked cabinet. This simple transaction is designed to show people the value of their data and the insights that can be gleaned by metadata collected over thousands of entries.

The DataCafe is a collaboration between students Chris Fussner, Noah Emrich, Henry Lam and Sophia Callahan, and was selected for the Parsons Festival hosted by Wanted Design. ‘The DataCafe attempts to address a number of concerns and challenges that we’re faced with today as our relationship with our devices becomes ever more intimate,’ Callahan tells LS:N Global.

The Big Picture: Being digitally native doesn’t mean people are digitally literate. Consumers are starting to realise the value of their data and brands will have to work harder to gain insights in The New Value Economy.